It's the start of a new week in this middle of September and that means it's time for a brand-new, late summer roundup of crime drama news:
THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES
Paul Greengrass (of the Jason Bourne series of films) will adapt, direct and produce a feature adaptation of Fairy Tale, the bestselling novel by Stephen King published earlier this month. King is a fan of Greengrass’s films and has granted him the option for the story that follows a 17-year-old boy who inherits the keys to a terrifying world where good and evil are at war. The stakes could not be higher, for that world and ours, as he journeys into the mythic roots of human storytelling. Greengrass noted, "Fairy Tale is a work of genius. A classic adventure story and also a disturbing contemporary allegory."
Fresh off starring in the Toronto Film Festival drama, North Of Normal, Sarah Gadon is set to make her directorial debut on Lullabies For Little Criminals, based on Heather O’Neill’s 2007 novel which won the Canada Reads competition. Gadon will also adapt the screenplay. The story follows thirteen-year-old Baby who vacillates between childhood comforts and adult temptation. Her father, Jules, takes better care of his drug habit than he does of his daughter, but when her blossoming beauty captures the attention of a charismatic and dangerous local criminal, it creates a volatile situation which threatens to crush Baby’s spirit.
TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES
The recent Emmy Awards celebration was nearly a shut-out as far as book-related major category winners were concerned. The exception was Dopesick, Hulu's limited series drama about the opioid crisis based on Beth Macy's book Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America. The Emmy for lead actor in a limited or anthology series or movie category went to series star, Michael Keaton. It was Keaton's first television show and a personal one for the actor, whose nephew died from a drug overdose. Dopesick's "Breakthrough Pain" episode earlier won a Creative Arts Emmy for outstanding cinematography for a limited or anthology series or movie. (HT to Shelf Awareness)
Regé-Jean Page and Glen Powell are set to star in a series inspired by Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid for Amazon, after the streamer handed the untitled project a straight-to-series order. Bridgerton star Page, who also starred in The Gray Man, is expected to play Butch Cassidy, with Top Gun: Maverick star Powell set to play the Sundance Kid in the series, which is reportedly set in an alternate America. The original Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid movie from 1969 was about a pair of Wild West outlaws (Paul Newman and Robert Redford) and was directed by George Roy Hill and written by William Goldman.
Dennis Quaid is set as a lead opposite Zazie Beetz, Claire Danes, and Timothy Olyphant in the HBO Max limited series, Full Circle, from director Steven Soderbergh and writer Ed Solomon. Soderbergh will direct all six episodes of the series and serve as executive producer. The story follows an investigation into a botched kidnapping that uncovers long-held secrets connecting multiple characters and cultures in present-day New York City. Quaid is believed to be playing a famous TV chef whose grandson was the target of the kidnapping.
Disney Television Studios’ ABC Signature is remaking the French detective series HIP (High Intellectual Potential). Work has already begun to adapt the scripts of the series, with showrunner, writing team, and cast still to be announced. HIP follows Morgane Alvaro, an intellectually-gifted housekeeper who becomes a consultant for the police serious crimes division in Lille. The original series was created by Alice Chegaray-Breugnot, Stéphane Carrié, and Nicolas Jean, and starred Audrey Fleurot and Mehdi Nebbou.
Shaun Sipos has been tapped as a major lead opposite Alan Ritchson in the upcoming second season of Reacher. From writer and showrunner Nick Santora and based on the novels by Lee Child, the series follows Jack Reacher (Ritchson), a veteran military police investigator who has just recently entered civilian life. In a one-year deal, Sipos will play David O’Donnell, who served with Reacher in the Army’s unit of special investigators and is like a brother to Reacher. While Season 1 was based on the first book in Child’s Jack Reacher series, Ritchson revealed in May on Instagram that Season 2 will follow the eleventh book in Child's series, Bad Luck and Trouble. David O’Donnell is a prominent character in that book, the only novel in the series he is featured in, which explains Sipos’ one-season deal.
Game of Thrones star John Bradley is set as the lead of North Shore, a Paramount+ crime thriller series from Cold Feet creator, Mike Bullen. Downton Abbey‘s Joanne Froggatt has also closed a one-year deal to star in the six-episode first season. North Shore follows the clash of cultures when British and Australian detectives team up to solve a complex murder mystery and uncover a conspiracy with international political consequences.
Tony Award-nominee, Tovah Feldshuh, has joined the cast of Amazon's Harlan Coben’s Shelter to play the character of Bat Lady, who is described as a wraith-like recluse who gives Mickey (Jaden Michael) an ominously disturbing piece of news. The series, an adaptation of Harlan Coben’s Mickey Bolitar novels, tells the story of high school junior Mickey Bolitar (Michael) as he navigates his new life with a mom in rehab, a dead father, an annoying aunt, and a new school in New Jersey with a camel as its mascot. When a creepy old lady who may or may not be a ghost tells Mickey that his father isn’t dead, Mickey is sure he’s losing his mind on top of everything else. Mickey finds a grounding force in Ashley Kent, another new student who’s lived through her own tragedy. But then Ashley goes missing, and as Mickey searches for her, he learns that everything she told him was a lie—and that he is in serious danger unless he gets to the bottom of what happened to her and his father.
PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO/AUDIO
The latest episode of the Crime Cafe podcast features Debbi Mack's interview with crime writer Indy Perro, whose debut novel is Central City.
Sunday Times chief political commentator and spy book fan, Tim Shipman, spoke with Spybrary's Ben Macintyre about his latest work, Prisoners of the Castle. During World War II, the German army used the towering Colditz Castle to hold the most defiant Allied prisoners. For four years, these prisoners of the castle tested its walls and its guards with ingenious escape attempts that would become legend.
Hailey Piper and Lilja Sigurdardóttir returned to the Queer Writers of Crime podcast to recommend books by Samantha Kolesnik, Paula Ashe, David Demchuk, and Sarah Stovell.
The new Mysteryrat's Maze Podcast featured the first chapter of Bait and Witch by Angela M. Sanders, read by actor Ariel Linn.
Adam Hamdy chatted with Crime Time FM's Paul Burke about the Other Side of Night; writing an original novel and the emotional journey you take the reader on; how characters convey meaning in a story; speculative thrillers; film and TV adaptations; page-turning excitement; and poetry.
My Favorite Detective Stories welcomed Mariah Fredericks, whose novel, Crunch Time, was nominated for an Edgar in 2007. Her Jane Prescott series, set in 1910s New York, has twice been nominated for the Mary Higgins Clark Award. Her next novel, The Lindbergh Nanny, will be published in November 2022.
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